


We Are Made of Star Stuff

by MinervaDashwood



Series: Maddy Brosca [6]
Category: Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Dalish, F/M, First Kiss, Fluff, Warden Alistair needs more stories
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-16
Updated: 2015-05-16
Packaged: 2018-03-30 21:32:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3952513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MinervaDashwood/pseuds/MinervaDashwood
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>First kiss.</p>
            </blockquote>





	We Are Made of Star Stuff

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from Carl Sagan. Thanks to [adaar-approves](http://adaar-approves.tumblr.com) for beta reading.

_“yours is the light by which my spirit's born: - you are my sun, my moon, and all my stars.” -- e.e. cummings_

______

 

Although it is well past sunset, the Dalish camp remains well-lit and lively.  Couples dance around the center firepit, Wynne and one of the young hunters amongst them, while a group of three older men provide uptempo music.  
  
Alistair’s thighs  ache from all the steps they climbed in the ruin--not once, but _twice_ \--yet he smiles over his mug of ale.  Moments of joviality have been rare in the past seven months, and it is an incredible relief to pause and simply be happy, if only for a moment.  
  
It seems he isn’t the only one who feels this way.  Sten and Zevran have joined the older men in a round of  quoits, Leliana chats animatedly with Gheyna and Cammen, Tiger frolics with the children, and Morrigan is no where to be found.  Alistair finishes his ale and looks for the one person who could make the night even better.  
  
After searching the other smaller fires, he shouldn’t be surprised to find her well away from everyone else.  However, there are torches even this far away from the festivities, so it’s easy to make out her shape sitting on the fence by the halla.  Her back is to him, but he would know her anywhere.  He’s spent most of his time following her around, after all, trusting her “stone sense” to get them where they needed to go.   Okay, maybe he _has_ been watching her a little more lately.  Since she’d accepted his rose, and he’d been brave enough to hold her hand once or twice  (three times, and he remembers all of them).  
  
"Hey," he says, climbing the fence, hoping it doesn’t give under his weight--but he should know better because the Dalish are as good at craftsmanship as they are at celebrations--and sits next to her.  
  
She looks at him and half smiles before returning her attention to the stars.  
  
“Still afraid you’ll float away?” he asks.  
  
She scoffs.  “Hardly.  I mean, it’s big, but it’s not scary.  Kinda pretty.”  
  
“Yeah,” he sighs, watching her lips move as she gazes skyward.  He knows a thing or two about pretty.  Like her dark lashes blinking at the stars, her half-parted lips, the round tip of her nose and her wide nostrils, and the smooth, dark skin of her neck.  He wonders how soft she must be and what it’d be like to trace his finger along her jaw, hold her chin between his forefinger and thumb, and guide her mouth to his.  
  
“Do you know what the pictures are? Up there?” she says.  
  
Alistair licks his lips and takes a moment to drag his thoughts away from her mouth.  “The constellations?”  
  
“Con-still-late-shins?”  
  
“Constellations,” he repeats, more slowly this time, and puts his arm around her.  
  
Her back stiffens, and her head jerks to meet his gaze.  He arches his eyebrows in question and smiles.  “I thought you might be cold.  You’re always complaining about how cold it is.”  
  
“I do not,” she counters, leaning on him.  “Tell me about the pictures.”  
  
Alistair’s arm is long enough to reach all the way around her, even though she’s bigger than when they met.  Back then she was skin and bones, but now there’s a layer of soft flesh over the lean muscles that make her quick and deadly.  He wants to touch every inch of it, but he wouldn’t know where to begin.  
  
With his arm resting on her shoulder, he points to the west.  “You see the cluster of triangles just over the second tallest mountain?”  
  
“I see them,” she says, placing her hand on his knee.  
  
Alistair takes a deep breath as his heartbeat increases, and he’s glad she doesn’t see him blush.  “It’s a lute player,” he whispers, his mouth close to her ear as he traces the sky with his finger.  “The body, and legs.  The lute.”  
  
It takes her a moment, but eventually, she sighs, “Oh,” in understanding.  “It looks like a map, I think,” she says, suddenly energetic.  She’s practically bouncing beside him, and she turns to look at him, grinning.  “Don’t you see?  It’s the area around Lake Calenhad.”  
  
He smiles back at her, enraptured by the glimmer in her eyes.  “Tell me.”  Not too long ago, seeing Maddy smile was like unearthing the rarest of gems: hard earned but worth it.  He dares to hope he’s a man worthy of her when she smiles at him, when her lips part and that ever-present tension between her eyes eases just a bit.  
  
She points to the sky with her short finger.  “Orzammar, Kinloch Hold, Redcliffe, and the mouth of the Dane make up that square.  And that line to the east is Lothering.  The star above that is West Hill.  You could trace the Dane to the sea, and the coast to Highever.”  
  
He wants to trace his thumb along her bottom lip, but he can’t remember the last time he saw her like this, smiling with her voice breathy and liquid-smooth.  
  
“You sound like honey,” he lets slip, and as soon as he does, he slams his mouth closed and pulls his lips between his teeth.  That sounded _much_ better in his head.  
  
“I what?”  She faces him, her lips parted and eyes wide.  
  
_Maybe she tastes like honey_ , he thinks, and he lowers his head and folds his body so he’s short enough, and with one last glance at her mouth, he licks his lips, closes his eyes, and abruptly falls backwards onto the ground.  
  
It takes him a long moment to realize what’s happened.  His grunt of surprise have sent the halla to bleating at one another, and the constant ache in his thighs is secondary to the sharp pain between his shoulder blades, where--he guesses--the hardest rock in all of Ferelden must be.  
  
“Alistair?” Maddy exclaims, and he opens his eyes to find her kneeling beside him, placing her hand on his forehead.  “Are you okay?”  
  
He shakes his head.  “Kiss me and make it better,” he murmurs, half a joke, half a plea.  “Maker, I am an idiot.”  
  
“You’re one of the smartest people I know,” she tells him.  She says it with such conviction that it pricks his heart.  After years of _do this, do that_ and never fitting anywhere, he’s found someone who makes him feel like he’s worth something, and all he had to do was be himself.  
  
She’s little more than a silhouette against the light of the moon and the torch behind her, but it’s enough to see her head coming towards him and he closes his eyes again, waiting for her mouth to touch his.  
  
She presses her hand onto his chest, and kisses his forehead.  
  
“Better?” she asks.  
  
“No,” he says, pushing himself until he’s sitting up, and Maddy is still on her knees next to him.  
  
Every time he’s imagined this, it was different, but the time for daydreaming is over.  The hand that’s closest to her grabs her hip, and his other hand threads through her hair, tilting her head right where he wants it.  
  
She tastes nothing like honey.  She is hope and home and forgiveness.  _Thank you for seeing me_ , his lips say without words.  It comes out as a groan, but he keeps kissing her like he’s never known anything else.  She says he’s smart, and he’s determined to study the mouth of Maddy Brosca as long as he lives and learn all he can.  His first lesson is the way her lips are both pliant and demanding, his next the way she gasps against his mouth making him think she’s as enraptured as he is.  
  
He stops for a breath and to gather his remaining wits.  He never intended to kiss her on the ground next to bleating halla, and he wonders what she must think after he’s fallen on his ass and embarrassed himself yet again.   But he doesn’t want to part with her.  He rests his forehead against hers, one hand still cradling the base of her head and the other on the small of her back.  
  
“That wasn’t too soon, was it?”  
  
She yanks on his tunic.  “Stop talking and do it again.”


End file.
